


pictures in frames of kisses on cheeks

by thistidalwave



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, First Dates, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Multi, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-01
Updated: 2015-04-01
Packaged: 2018-03-20 16:37:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3657528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thistidalwave/pseuds/thistidalwave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Kent</b><br/>The cute guy in my class hurt himself and is on crutches. My first thought was "Good. He'll be easier to take down." Like he’s a gazelle and I’m a dick tiger.</p><p><b>Jack</b><br/>What’s wrong with you?</p>
            </blockquote>





	pictures in frames of kisses on cheeks

**Author's Note:**

> thx to the twitter crew for the many ideas for things for these babes to do on their date <3

**Kent**  
The cute guy in my class hurt himself and is on crutches. My first thought was "Good. He'll be easier to take down." Like he’s a gazelle and I’m a dick tiger.

 **Jack**  
What’s wrong with you?

 **Kent**  
Nothing (sunglasses emoji)

 **Jack**  
You wish.

 **Kent**  
(sunglasses emoji)(flex emoji)(smirk emoji)

-

“I don’t know about this,” Jack says.

Kent rolls his eyes. “Jesus fucking christ, Zimms. If I have to listen to you whine about this guy any more I’m gonna straight up lose it. You’re doing this.”

“What if he says _no_?” Jack turns panicked eyes on Kent. 

“Have you seen yourself in a mirror lately? He’s not gonna say no. Your tiny figure skater crush is going to swoon into your arms, trust me,” Kent says.

Jack frowns. “He’s not going to _swoon_.”

Kent flaps his hand dismissively and leans against the bleachers that are set up in the viewing area. “He’ll say yes,” he says. “When is he even going to get here?” 

“He usually shows up with a bunch of the other figure skaters? I’ve seen a few of them walk past already,” Jack says. He’s looking panicked again. “What if he doesn’t show?”

“Then you’ll catch him next time, dude, it’s not the end of the world,” Kent says easily. “Hey, do you think tomorrow is a good day to ask my guy out? I’m thinking I can catch him after class pretty easy, he’s got those crutches and all the dumb books we have to read for class to deal with, so he’ll be slow moving.”

“Please don’t start calling yourself a dick tiger again,” Jack says, looking pained.

Kent grins. “You love it. I’m the greatest dick tiger.” 

“Oh God,” Jack says, abruptly tensing up and standing up straighter. “I can see him.” 

“Remember, you got this. We’ll be going on double dates in no time,” Kent tells him, craning his neck to look in the direction Jack is. “What did you say he looked like again? Blonde?” 

“Yeah, he’s—” He flaps a hand to indicate where his crush is, which doesn’t help Kent find him at all, but a familiar face does catch Kent’s eye.

“Hey! That’s—” 

“He’s on crutches,” Jack says at the same time, swinging his head to look at Kent. “Oh no.”

Kent stares at him. Jack stares back. “Southern?” Kent asks. “Short? The cutest little ass you’ve ever seen?”

“Walking right past us?” Jack asks wryly. 

They both watch as Eric Bittle makes his way past them and through the door into the rink. He’s pretty skilled with his crutches; he doesn’t even struggle with the door at all.

“Oh my God,” Kent says when he’s out of sight. 

“We were talking about the same person,” Jack says unnecessarily.

Kent smirks. “Hey, at least now I know you’ve got great fuckin’ taste.” 

Jack groans. “Maybe next time you can describe the guy you’re going to ‘take down’ with more detail. Or, you know, mention his name.”

“Hey, like you’re any better. All you said is that he was blonde, skates really well, and said, like, two words to you once. And you’ve been talking about him way longer than I have!” 

Jack sighs. He can’t argue that; he’s been hanging around after hockey practice to watch Eric skate since last semester, and Kent had only just registered for the first year English class he shares with him this semester. “So. What are we going to do now?” 

“What does the bro code say we do?” Kent asks. 

“I don’t know,” Jack says. He chews on his bottom lip, thinking, then says, “Maybe that you concede to me because I have… dibs? Because I saw him first?” He wrinkles his nose.

“Fuck that,” Kent says. “I’m a _tiger_.”

“Please stop,” Jack says. “That’s stupid anyway, I can’t claim ownership of him.” 

“True,” Kent agrees. “Maybe we can both ask him out?”

“What, like make him choose? Wouldn’t that just be… awkward? For everyone?” He looks genuinely concerned. “I don’t want to bring another person into our competitive shit.”

Kent smirks. He and Jack really are competitive with each other about nearly everything. It works for them, but the frequent arguing and insults often confuse other people. He looks at Jack, studying the concerned slant of his jaw and the thoughtful purse of his lips, and then says, “We could both date him.” 

“You want to share him? I don’t think that’s f—”

Kent steps in close to Jack and touches his wrist. Jack’s last word dies in his throat. Kent tilts his head and smiles his most charming smile, watching with interest the ripple of Jack’s throat when he swallows nervously. “We could also,” Kent says quietly, “date each other.” 

“We…” Jack starts, then clears his throat, avoiding eye contact. He’s having flashbacks to the emotional rollercoaster that was sophomore year, when they’d had one glorious semester that ended in a mess of carnage and took twice as long to rebuild back to a semblance of their former relationship, and he’d really rather not. “We tried that, remember? It didn’t go very well.” 

Kent shrugs. “So we weren’t good for each other then—maybe we were just missing something.” 

Understanding dawns on Jack’s face. “That’s an awful lot of expectation to put on a guy we’ve never even talked to,” he points out.

“So serious,” Kent teases, huffing. “Isn’t any relationship about expectations? Besides, we’re only asking, he doesn’t have to agree. Although he should, we’re like double the catch together.”

“Oh no.”

“There are twice the fish in the sea,” Kent continues gleefully, ignoring Jack. “He gets twice the bang for his buck. He’ll be taking out two birds with one… dick.”

“Stop it, you’re not funny,” Jack says. 

“You lie,” Kent says.

Jack still looks doubtful, though, so Kent changes tact and leans in closer to him. Jack’s eyes flicker across his face, clearly settling on his lips for a moment before he looks away again. For all the things they’ve been through, they’ve never once lost their chemistry. “Come on,” Kent says softly, right into Jack’s ear. He can feel Jack shiver slightly. “Be my dick tigress.”

“Ugh, fuck you,” Jack says, shoving Kent away from him. Kent stumbles backward, laughing. “Fine, we’ll ask.”

“Sweet,” Kent says, adjusting the collar of his shirt and running his fingers through his hair. “How do I look?”

“Like a douche,” Jack deadpans. 

Kent rolls his eyes. “Good. Let’s go.” He starts walking toward the door, then stops when he realizes Jack isn’t following. “Zimms?”

“Shouldn’t we wait for his practice to be over?” 

Kent stares at him. “He’s injured,” he says. “He’s not skating, I think he can have a conversation.”

Jack’s cheeks flush pink. It really only serves to make him more attractive. “Oh… right.” He hurries to catch up with Kent.

Eric is sitting on the bench alone, watching a pair skate. He looks up when Kent and Jack approach and smiles a little, clearly confused. “Hi there.”

“Hey,” Kent says, sitting down next to him. “I’m Kent. This is Jack.” Jack raises a hand in an awkward wave and then shoves his hands into the pockets of his track pants. Kent despairs of him; it’s a good thing Kent’s got enough game for the both of them.

“I’m Eric. It’s nice to meet you,” he says, offering a hand. Kent smiles, amused, and shakes it. Eric reaches out and shakes Jack’s hand, too, flashing him a huge smile. Jack looks slightly surprised, but he smiles back. “Y’all are on the hockey team, right? I see you hanging around Faber sometimes,” he says to Jack. He looks at Kent. “Not so much you.”

Kent shrugs. “I’m in that poetry class with you?”

“Oh!” Eric says. “Yeah, I’ve seen you. I didn’t recognize you without the tie.” He laughs, and Kent is utterly charmed by it.

“Fair enough,” Kent says. “It is my staple accessory, after all.”

“He thinks it makes him look classy,” Jack says. Kent rolls his eyes. He’s a business student; he’s _supposed_ to look professional, and he won’t let anyone tell him otherwise. 

“It makes him look… something,” Eric says, obviously looking Kent over with an appreciative eye. Kent leans back and straightens his legs out to give him a better view. Eric looks away quickly.

“What happened to your…?” Jack asks, gesturing at Eric’s crutches.

“Oh, my ankle,” Eric says, filling in the blank. “Sprained. I, uh, landed a jump wrong.” 

Both Kent and Jack wince. “Six weeks?” Jack asks.

Eric nods. “Max, if I’m lucky.” He’s still smiling, but he clearly doesn’t want to talk about it, because he immediately changes the subject. “So what brings you two to figure skating practice?” 

Jack looks so caught out that it’s almost comical. “Uh…”

“You,” Kent says. 

Eric raises one eyebrow. “Oh?” 

Kent nods. “You see,” he says, sliding closer to Eric and putting his arm behind Eric on the bench, “we ran into a bit of a dilemma, and we were hoping you could help us sort it out.”

“And what was that?” Eric asks, gaze flicking from Kent to Jack and back again. 

Kent turns his charming smile up to eleven. “Would you want to date us?” 

Eric laughs slightly, blushing and looking at Jack like maybe he’ll tell him that Kent is joking. “Uh, yeah,” Eric says. “I’d date either of you, I guess? You’re both, uh… attractive? Is this some sort of bet?” 

Kent balks at that, leaning away from Eric a bit in surprise. He’s about to say no, but Jack beats him to it. “Of course not,” he says. “We both want you.”

“Oh! Um,” Eric stammers. His face is bright red now. “You, uh…” 

Jack just stares at him and does nothing to clarify what he’d just said. He’s lucky he’s pretty and that Kent is here to dig them out of this hole. “Jesus, Zimms, gain some tact. What he _means_ ,” Kent says carefully, leaning back in and putting his hand on Eric’s thigh for good measure, “is that we want to ask you out. Like, to dinner and a movie? With both of us.”

Eric stares at Kent’s hand on his thigh for a long moment before he looks up at Kent. Their faces are pretty close together, and Kent deliberately drops his gaze to Eric’s mouth for a second before lifting the corner of his mouth in a tiny smile. Eric’s face is still red, but he looks less out of his depth now.

“No,” Jack says just as Eric is opening his mouth to respond. Eric snaps his mouth shut, and Kent stares at Jack incredulously. He wishes he could give Jack an emphatic abort signal without Eric noticing. “I mean, date, yes, but not dinner and a movie. That’s boring, Parse. I thought you had more game than that.”

“Hey, what the fuck!” Kent protests. “Dinner and a movie is a perfectly respectable date!” 

“Sure, if you want to be a _cliché_ ,” Jack says. 

“Things are clichés for a reason, Jack. Because they work.” 

Jack rolls his eyes. It infuriates Kent in that invigorating way he loves so much. “I already had a plan in mind for what I was going to ask Eric to do, so if you don’t mind…” He turns emphatically to Eric, who has been watching this entire argument with wide eyes. Kent abruptly realizes that his hand is still on Eric’s thigh. He leaves it there, because why the fuck not. “Do you like animals?” 

Eric raises his eyebrows. “Yeah, sure.”

“Would you want to go to the zoo with me? Or, uh, wait. With us.” 

Jack blushes, and Kent fails at holding back a snort. “The _zoo_?” Kent says disbelievingly. “ _That’s_ your not-cliché date idea?”

“Hey,” Eric says, turning stern eyes on Kent. “Don’t be mean.” Kent immediately presses his mouth shut. Something in Eric’s gaze makes Kent want to please him. 

“So?” Jack asks nervously.

“So, um, wow,” Eric says. He looks amused now, which is much better than terrified. “I can hardly say no after you two went to all this trouble to plan how you were going to ask me, now can I?” 

“You can say no if you want,” Jack assures him earnestly, completely missing the joke.

Kent, for his part, laughs. “Don’t mind him,” he tells Eric. “He’s a sarcastic son of a bitch himself, but he tends to miss it in others.”

“...oh,” Jack says. 

“And cut us some slack, hey?” Kent continues, squeezing Eric’s thigh lightly. “We just realized we were crushing on the same guy like twenty minutes ago.” 

“Oh, _well_ then,” Eric says. “Free pass for lack of good communication, of course. I’ll totally go to the zoo with you both. When were you thinking?” 

Jack and Kent exchange a look. “This weekend?” Kent hedges. Jack shrugs.

“Okay,” Eric says, looking at once doubtful and amused by them. “One of you give me your phone and I’ll put my number in it, and then you can text me details.” 

Kent leans back to dig his phone out of his pocket and hand it over to Eric. When he gets it back, there’s a new contact named “Eric Bittle :)”. Kent smiles at it and texts him “hi.” He can feel Eric’s phone vibrate in his pocket between them, and he jumps. Eric laughs at him. 

“Thanks,” Kent says, standing up like that’s what he intended all along. “We’ll text you.”

Eric nods. “See you around.” 

“Bye,” Jack says. Eric smiles at him. 

“Well,” Kent says when they’re safely back on the other side of the doors, where Eric can’t hear them, “that went well.” 

“Could’ve been worse,” Jack says. He smirks. “Could’ve been better.” 

“Ugh,” Kent says, shoving him. Jack shoves him back, and they head out of Faber, walking too close together and grinning.

-

 **Kent**  
Excited to see you today (wink emoji)  
Jack says he is too (smirk emoji)

 **Eric**  
Did he pick that emoji?

 **Kent**  
No but he made that face

 **Eric**  
Uh huh.  
(wink emoji)(smirk emoji)  
I’m waiting by the huge tree

 **Kent**  
We see you!!!!! (heart-eyes emoji)

-

“Heart eyes are a bit forward, don’t you think?” Eric asks when Kent and Jack find him by the zoo entrance. He looks damn good, even bundled into at least three layers that can be seen despite the fact that it’s actually a fairly nice day, if a bit windy. Kent is thoroughly jealous of his perfectly styled hair, and he’s definitely of the opinion that the heart-eye emoji was necessary.

Kent waggles his eyebrows at Eric. “I felt them in my soul, baby,” he says.

Eric laughs. “Well, hi, anyway,” he says. “I bought us all day passes while I was waiting.”

Jack makes a protesting noise. “We asked _you_ out, though.”

“He _means_ to say thank you,” Kent says, elbowing Jack in the side. Jack glares at him.

Eric shrugs and hands them both wristbands. “You can buy me food later,” he tells Jack. 

Jack looks appeased by that. “Are you going to be okay walking around?” he asks while Kent is struggling to put his wristband on. They probably should have thought of that ahead of time. Jack reaches out to help Kent without looking away from Eric. “With the crutches, I mean.”

“Yeah, sure,” Eric says. “As long as you don’t go running off on me.” 

“We’ll take it slow,” Kent assures him, taking Jack’s wristband and putting it on for him. 

They make their way into the zoo, Kent and Jack following Eric on either side of him. Jack glances nervously over at Kent, and Kent shrugs, widening his eyes. 

“Are you two silently communicating behind my back?” Eric asks.

“No,” Kent says.

“Yes,” Jack says.

“Okay, uh, I have a question,” Eric says, stopping next to the zoo map and turning to look at them. “Are you two already dating? Like, previously to asking me?” 

“No,” Kent says.

“We used to,” Jack clarifies. “A couple years ago.” 

Eric nods slowly. “And that…”

“Went badly,” Kent finishes. “We’re friends again now, though, right, Jack?” He punches Jack in the shoulder.

“For some reason,” Jack agrees. He looks at Eric. “Is that… cool with you?”

“Oh, um,” Eric says, “yes, I was just wondering what I was getting myself into.”

Kent snorts. “A world of trouble, probably,” he says.

Eric smiles at that. “At least you’re honest.” He turns back to the zoo map. “Which way do you guys want to go around the loop?” 

Jack immediately points out that there’s actually more than one loop and pulls a folded up paper version of the map out of his jacket pocket. There’s red permanent marker all over it, arrows and circles making it look not unlike a hockey play. “I, uh, made a plan of action,” Jack says nervously, the way Eric and Kent are looking at him making him suddenly shy.

Kent lets out a low whistle. “And you called _me_ boring.”

“It’s cute,” Eric says, taking the map from Jack and studying it. “You’re cute.” Jack’s cheeks flush pink, and Eric’s smile widens. “Are you always that easy to make blush?” 

“He’s easy for you,” Kent says, winking at Eric. The tips of Eric’s ears turn red, and Kent grins triumphantly.

They follow Jack’s plan, wandering slowly through, taking their time at every exhibit. Eric and Jack keep stopping to read the information plaques at every enclosure while Kent alternately talks to the animals and takes selfies with them. Eric joins him for the selfies when he’s done reading and, to Kent’s delight, refuses when Jack offers to take the picture for them when they’re by the big cats. 

“The selfie is a sacred art,” Eric tells Jack seriously.

Jack nods at him just as seriously, but he makes a confused face at Kent when Eric isn’t looking. Kent stifles his laugh. “Oh, so when _he_ says it you agree,” Kent says quietly. “What has he got that I don’t?”

“For starters, his ass isn’t the size of Jupiter,” Jack teases.

“I can hear you!” Eric says from a little ways up the path.

“Good!” Jack yells back. “You can back me up, then.” 

Kent lets himself laugh out loud this time. “You like my ass, right, Eric?”

Eric turns around and looks at them disbelievingly. “I’d like it better if you weren’t dragging it,” he says. “Who here is on crutches again? Come on, we’ve got birds to look at.” 

It turns out that you can actually feed the lorikeets, which Eric does gleefully. It’s adorable, even from where Kent is watching at a distance. He kind of wishes they weren’t lingering in the bird enclosure. The constant tweeting noises are ominous. 

“What’s wrong with you?” Jack asks after a minute.

“Oh, nothing,” Kent says, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I mean, there was this one time when I was a kid—”

He’s interrupted by a bird swooping at his head, heading straight for his cowlick. He ducks and covers his head, narrowly avoiding actually throwing himself into the dirt. He might shriek a bit. He’s not proud.

“Stop yelling, you’re scaring the bird!” Eric admonishes him. 

“Stop flapping your hands, too,” Jack says. “You’re making it worse.”

“What about _me_?” Kent mutters from where he’s crouching, palms firmly pressed over his hair. “What about how scared _I_ am?” 

“Shhhh,” Eric says. 

Eric and Jack end up having to lead Kent out of the bird enclosure, each holding one of his elbows while he keeps his hands on top of his head. He drops his hands when they’re safely out and sighs loudly.

Eric rearranges Kent’s hair, running his hands slowly through it. Kent holds his breath and thinks about kissing Eric. “Were you saying that happened to you when you were little, too?” 

Kent nods, pouting for maximum pathetic effect. 

“Poor baby,” Eric says softly. “Are you ready to go get food now?”

“Yes, I’m traumatized and honestly I think only a cherry slush will fix it,” Kent says. Jack snorts, and Kent points an accusing finger at him. “And for that, mister, you’re buying it for me.” 

“Sure I am,” Jack says sarcastically. 

Jack does buy Kent’s slush, though, along with the rest of their food. He bumps Kent’s hip gently with his own when they’re standing in line waiting to order while Eric snags them a table. “You okay?” he asks.

“Ask me again in a month, I should be over it by then,” Kent says, but he smiles at Jack reassuringly. 

The table Eric is sitting at is over by the bushes, nearly set apart from the rest of them. There’s a spray of yellow flowers right next to where Jack sits down, and he leans over and picks one. He reaches out and tucks it carefully behind Eric’s ear. “Almost as pretty as you,” he says. His tongue feels dry, and he resists the urge to wipe his sweaty palms on his thighs. 

“Flatterer,” Eric says, but his cheeks are pink. 

“You do know that sign says not to pick the flowers, right?” Kent asks, pointing at the sign in question.

Jack had definitely read the sign and done it anyway. “Shut up,” he says. “Do you want a flower?” 

“No,” Kent says.

Jack knows better. He picks another one and offers it to Kent. Kent dramatically puts a hand over his heart and pretends to swoon, tilting his ear toward Jack. Jack sighs and puts the flower behind Kent’s ear. Kent grins at him, and Jack’s heart skips a beat.

They dig into their food then, keeping each other busy between mouthfuls with idle chatter about their lives. They learn that Eric lives in Madison when he’s not at Samwell, that he loves to bake, and that he’d briefly played hockey, but had missed figure skating too much and switched back. He understands enough about hockey to get it when they tell him about how they’d first met when they were freshmen and immediately clicked on the ice, but Kent and Jack are both amazed when he has no idea who Bad Bob Zimmermann is. Eric apparently _does_ know who Lardo is, though, once they tell him her actual name. He seems skeptical when they tell him about her kegster victories, but that’s fine. He’ll learn.

By the time they’re done eating, their tongues are stained shades of blue and red from the slushies. Eric sticks his own purple tongue, gained by drinking from both Jack’s and Kent’s slushes, out at them. 

“We should take a selfie,” Jack says. 

Kent mock gasps. “Jack Zimmermann said _what_?” 

“Shut up,” Jack says. 

Eric already has his phone out. They squish together on one side of the table and take two selfies, one of them sticking out their tongues and the other of them smiling normally. “Perfect,” Eric says, looking at the pink flush of all their cheeks and the way his and Kent’s flowers droop off their ears. 

Directly next to the concession area is the petting exhibit, so they head there next. Kent keeps nearly tripping over the children that are running around, much to Eric’s amusement, and to make matters worse the llama spits right Kent’s face. He wipes it off with a grimace. “Why is it always me?” he asks forlornly. “What did I ever do to these animals to deserve this?” 

Jack doesn’t stop laughing at him for a good five minutes, and when Kent thinks he’s finally done, he waits until Kent is cautiously petting a donkey to take a picture and pointedly show it to Eric. “Look,” he says, “two assholes.” 

Eric laughs just as hard as Jack does. Kent rolls his eyes as aggressively as possible. “I’m going to the underwater exhibit,” he says, stomping off. Eric and Jack follow him, still giggling. 

The underwater exhibit is, in a word, peaceful. Kent likes it best because there’s no way anything in the water can attack him. When he says that, Eric looks devious and drags Kent over to a touch pool, which Kent resolutely refuses to put his hand in, no matter how much Eric pouts at him. 

Then Jack wanders over, done reading the information plaque about the turtles, and makes puppy dog eyes at Kent. 

Kent touches the stupid fucking starfish. Nothing hurts him. It’s an anticlimactic experience.

As peaceful as the underwater exhibit is, it’s also fairly dark and full of random turns. They end up getting separated for awhile, wandering off in different directions, and it takes a couple minutes of searching for Kent to find Jack alone by the tropical fish. 

“Dark in here,” Kent says.

Jack looks sidelong at him. “Yeah.”

Kent leans in to whisper in Jack’s ear. “I think it’s time for you to step up as my dick tigress.”

Jack jerks away from him. “Fuck, I thought you’d stopped with that,” he says. “What are you talking about?” 

“I _mean_ let’s go find Eric and kiss him in a dark corner,” Kent says. 

“Oh,” Jack says. “Okay.”

They find Eric in the thankfully empty jellyfish room. Kent glances over at Jack and nods, and they both sneak up behind Eric and each kiss him on a cheek. Eric starts so hard that he probably would have fallen over if they hadn’t been there to steady him.

“Oh my Lord,” Eric says, pressing a hand to his chest. “You two startled me.” 

“That was the idea,” Kent says, kissing him on the cheek again.

“Was it?” Eric asks speculatively. He glances around. “We’re pretty alone in here.”

“That we are,” Jack agrees.

Eric raises one eyebrow in a challenge. “Is a kiss on the cheek the best you two can do?” 

Jack kisses Eric for real, straight on the mouth. Eric leans into it, swaying so his weight is all on his good foot, and his hand flies out to steady himself on Kent’s chest. “Mmmm, that’s better,” Eric says when they break apart, and he turns to kiss Kent as well, short and sweet and perfect just the same as the one with Jack. “Okay, now you two,” Eric demands. Kent and Jack are all too happy to oblige.

Eric beams at them. “Now we can say that our first kiss was by the jellyfish,” he says, looking inordinately pleased.

“Yeah,” Jack agrees. Kent nods. They could point out that they’ve kissed before, but they both know that’s not what Eric meant. It had really felt like a first kiss anyway.

Eric is obviously starting to get tired, moving pretty slowly as they’re leaving the underwater exhibit, and Kent puts a hand on his shoulder to get him to stop. “Hey,” he says, “want a piggyback?” He’s gratified when Eric’s face lights up.

It’s an arduous process, but they manage to get Eric situated on Kent’s back. He stumbles around the path a lot for dramatic effect because it makes Eric cling to him harder and laugh. Jack follows behind them with Eric’s crutches, shaking his head. 

“Hey, you know what the baboons remind me of?” Eric asks when Kent stops by their enclosure so Eric can read the plaque. 

“What?” Kent asks.

Eric makes a show of failing to actually lower his voice at all. “Jack’s ass.”

Kent laughs so hard he almost drops Eric. Almost.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up,” Jack says. “If I have a baboon’s ass, then you have a face like a meerkat, Parse.”

“Hey!” Kent protests. “I’m not even the one who said it!” 

“Eric’s too cute to insult,” Jack says.

“Meerkats are pretty cute,” Eric points out. 

Jack makes a face at him and puts a finger over his own lips. Kent snickers. 

The monkeys are the last exhibit before they’re back where they started. Kent reluctantly puts Eric down when they get back to the map and shakes out his arms. They stand close together in a little triangle, all of the reluctant to call it quits for the day.

“What was your favorite animal?” Jack asks.

“Oooh,” Eric says, looking thoughtful. “Oh, the river otters! For sure.”

Kent and Jack exchange a look, both obviously remembering how excited Eric had been about them. It had probably been the most adorable thing they’ve witnessed in their entire lives. “Me too,” Jack says.

“Same,” Kent agrees. “Although… those were some pretty nice jellyfish as well.”

Both Jack and Eric blush. Kent smirks. He loves how easy that is.

“Well,” Eric says after another extended silence, “this was pretty much a perfect first date, if you ask me.” 

“Absolutely,” Kent says. 

“Let’s do it again sometime,” Jack says. “I mean, well, I guess again would mean it was a second date, but—”

“Don’t worry,” Kent says, clapping Jack reassuringly on the shoulder. “We get it.” 

-

 **Eric**  
So two of your hockey bros asked me out.

 **Larissa**  
hahaha omg Eric, get it. What did you do? 

**Eric**  
Said yes. 

**Larissa**  
To which one??

 **Eric**  
Both. The three of us had a very nice time together :) 

**Larissa**  
… please never give me the details. Ever.


End file.
